Quiescent
by RenaYumi
Summary: AU/Past The gang spends Christmas together as children. Cuteness warning!


**Quiescent** 

**Here's this year's Christmas fic! I promised I'd get it done today, and so I did. It's also my Q. Bam. To Kitty, Merry Christmas!**

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**Mo**onlight streamed into the room, glimmering through the cream gauss curtains and danced across the vaulted ceiling. It wasn't much past midnight, and not much past Wednesday. But even though this room, cast in this light, should never been seen on a Thursday morning, he was awake.

And with good reason. From down the hall in his daughters room, he heard laughter. Tinkling, childish laughter. The same laughter that had filled the day before in a whirlwind of Christmas Eve activities and five tiny tykes that we so excited for Santa's arrival. The children were inseparable. They had been raised together on one of Kadic's cul-de-sacs, not far from the children's elementary school.

The parents of these five were used to hosting all of them at the same time for an overnight stay, or a birthday party, or a summer outing at the beach. What they had not expected was children's proposal of spending Christmas together. _'That way Santa would only have to make one stop.' _No parent could argue with the logic of turning multiple errands into one errand.

So, when the children piled into little Yumi Ishiyama's room for the night, the parents spent the next three hours filling the living room with bag after bag of presents from Santa. It looked like a toy store had exploded under the tree, which had to be moved back against the wall to accommodate for all the presents.

But now, those children that had slept peacefully through several loud crashes, a few broken Christmas bulbs and a little bit of colorful language from the parents were giggling.

Takeo sat up in bed, glancing down at his sleeping wife who seemed to be immune to children's laughter. There was a small thump, and the house went silent again, the laughter stopping abruptly.

And then Yumi's bedroom door creaked. The man sighed, dragging himself from bed and headed for the hall to intercept the kids before they could get downstairs.

"Do you see him?" The smallest of the bunch, little pink headed Aelita, was on her tip toes, trying to see over the railing. Her pink nightgown swished around her knees when Yumi bumped into her.

"I think he's invisible."

"He is not," Jeremie answered. He was blonde, dressed in a matching set of Hulk pajamas. "We're suppose to be asleep. What if he leaves?"

"I don't want him to leave!" Aelita looked startled and worried, hands gripping the railing.

"Ulrich, stop moving!" The tallest of the bunch whispered. "I'm going to fall!"

"Odd you're heavy!" The brunette whose back he was standing on protested.

"Just, stop moving-- wow!"

"Shhh!" the rest of the children insisted.

"There's so many presents!" Yumi grinned, tugging the boy off of Ulrich.

"See? I told you he's know you guys were here!" Ulrich brushed himself off, grinning at the eldest of the bunch.

"Let's go down and see!" Yumi swayed for a moment, looking at her friends.

"But Mommy said we had to wait for her and Daddy in the morning."

"We won't touch," Odd reasoned with her, tugging Aelita towards the steps. "You're not chicken are you?"

"No!" Aelita giggled, grabbing Jeremie's hand and then Ulrich's.

"Odd called you chicken, Yumi."

"Yumi is not chicken," Jeremie defended.

"Is too," Odd told her, edging backwards down the first step. Yumi's face turned pink and she balled up her tiny fist, hitting the boy in the shoulder.

"I am not!"

"Ouch! She hit me! You can't hit! Santa will bring you coal."

"Santa's already been here, dummy," Ulrich informed him, gesturing down the stairs. Odd pouted turning around to go down the stairs.

"Well, I want to see if the big one is mine." Aelita eyed Yumi for a moment.

"Oh, okay." The five children made their way clumsily down the stairs to the living room, just in time for Yumi's father to catch them.

"Kids!" he hissed from the top of the stairs. "It's not time for presents yet!" The halted all movement from the children as they crept towards the pile of gifts.

"But Daddy," Yumi whined. "We couldn't sleep." Takeo didn't budge, eyes narrowed at them down into the darkly lit living room.

"Aww, man," Odd sighed. He followed Ulrich as the boy quickly trudged up the stairs, the others right behind them.

_merrychristmasmerrychristmas_

Many hours later, after hundreds of feet of wrapping paper, dozens and dozens of toys, and thousands of pictures, Christmas morning was slowly started to wind down. The Hoppers, Ishiyamas, Della Robbies, Sterns and Belpois were all gathered in the kitchen for breakfast.

The parents, that is. The children had fallen asleep in various spots on the living floor, exhausted from being awake since midnight and from running around the living room tearing into their presents with an excitement only children could carry on Christmas morning.

So their parents, after plucking their sleeping children from the mounds wrapping paper, moved them back up to Yumi's room to sleep off their excitement.

"Shh, do you hear that?" Anna Della Robbia asked. The kitchen fell silent.

"I don't hear anything," Franz Hopper said over his coffee. The blonde woman grinned.

"They're quiet." No one said anything for a moment. The rarity was not lost on any of the parents as they enjoyed their peace.

"Well," Takeo sighed. "Merry Christmas, everyone."


End file.
